This invention relates to an automatic closing modesty curtain and its use in safety showers and the like.
The key to the invention is that once the curtain has been triggered to close, there are no additional manipulations required by the user because the curtain will completely close by itself. This leaves the operator's hands free to perform other tasks using both hands, such as removing chemically contaminated clothing as rapidly as possible.
In the prior art, there are two patents that relate to the subject matter. Gustavson, U.S. Pat. No. 2,284,144, issued on May 26, 1942 and Shoup, U.S. Pat. No. 2,826,365, issued Mar. 11, 1958. Both deal with voting machines wherein the movement of the manually operated handle closes the curtain about the user prior to actuating the vote counting mechanism of the machine. When the vote counting operation has been finished, the voter moves the handle manually in the opposite direction from that first used when the voter entered the voting booth and this movement opens the curtain and allows the voter to step out of the booth. It should be noted, and emphasized, that the entire operation is manual and requires continuous, positive force by the user to both open and close the curtains.